


Warped of Bubonic Sense

by IneffableDoll



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angel's Essence, Angst, Child Death, Conflicting Tones, Dark, Healing, Historical References, Hopeful Ending, I guess????, Other, Plague, Rating for Language, The Black Death, the fourteenth century
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:40:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22947961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IneffableDoll/pseuds/IneffableDoll
Summary: Crowley hated the fourteenth century.To anyone else, it might’ve sounded like a joke. Haha, the immortal has a least favorite century. How quirky, how amusing.It wasn’t. There was nothing “funny” about the way serpentine pupils became daggers at its mentions, at its thoughts. The electric ebony of hatred that formed a squall in the mind of the demon. Because, as it turns out, Pestilence doesn’t have a great sense of humor.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 29





	Warped of Bubonic Sense

London, in the Year of Someone’s Lord 2019

Crowley hated the fourteenth century.

To anyone else, it might’ve sounded like a joke. Haha, the immortal has a least favorite century. How quirky, how amusing.

It wasn’t. There was nothing “funny” about the way serpentine pupils became daggers at its mentions, at its thoughts. The electric ebony of hatred that formed a squall in the mind of the demon. Because, as it turns out, Pestilence doesn’t have a great sense of humor.

The Black Death (or the Great Pestilence, or the Great Plague, or the Middle Finger from God – however one wished to call it) was devastating for humanity, but humanity had a way of forgetting over time. It helped that they tended to die out and memories became stories which became history. But Crowley would never forget, never could try to banish from his mind the burning souls and the blank eyes and the blood tears that wallowed in every step he took those years.

Crowley was a demon. He had been for a marvelously long time, in fact, and had been witness to any number of catastrophes and disasters both before and after. The Wars, Plagues, Famines, DEATH. And, despite whatever anyone else expected, it would be rather soft to say that he did not. Fucking. Enjoy them.

London, in the Year of Someone’s Lord 1349

When he felt that she was back, he knew this was going to be a little different than the times before.

Still.

There was really only so much good a demon could get away with – that limit typically somewhere between “none” and “not a bit.” This barrier was less restrictive for Crowley, who thrived on loopholes like an extortionist. Hell might see if he was not careful, but Crowley was, and always had been, anything if not careful to a fault. He managed what he could and where he could without Hell interfering, but he almost didn’t care if they did see. Hell hadn’t caused it, but Heaven hadn’t stopped it, and he hated them both with a fire even holy water mightn’t quell.

Humanity withered on the brink. The brink of something he dared not name.

Already, Pestilence had made her walk for a number of years, and still she seemed never to sleep, so Crowley didn’t either.

One day, he found a child. A _child_ , goddamn it all.

It was when he watched the life slip out of calm, tired faces that he sighed. When the life dripped from screaming faces, shattered in terror, that he ached. But when that abysmal suffering tainted the face of a child, a child whose eyes cried out to know why they deserved this, why living felt like this…that’s when he nearly broke. He kept himself together and carried on – he HAD to – doing what he could and knowing that it wasn’t enough. Nothing could be enough. It was all fucking pointless.

The child shivered, though her skin scorched to the touch, and she screamed without a sound. She had no right to be sprawled so helplessly in the putrid gunk of this alleyway, in human waste and surrounded by rotting corpses, oozing fluids and crawling with maggots. Trapped in eternal anonymity between gray daub walls and thatched rooves, the sky bleary and mocking in it’s vivid, screaming blue. The girl had nothing, no one – not even a kind hand of reassurance to watch her go.

Crowley knelt beside her and placed a hand on her chest, fluttering with each shallow, mucus-clogged breath. No amount of magic could undo now what was already half done.

When the child’s eyes flickered open, a sliver of green in a corner of a hollowing city, Crowley saw that Death had claimed her as his own, even as she mouthed something, a final call for help she would never receive.

He prayed. It was fitting, how human he seemed as the gravel dug bloody craters into his knees through his thin cloak, the same question on his tongue as had always been: why? _Why do You let these things happen, again and again? Will they never be enough for You?_

He did not expect an answer. There never was one.

When he encountered the familiar sheath of white curls some weeks later, it was not in the way he expected, either. It was in a brief moment of eye contact, of recognition from a distance, and a gap that closed.

Aziraphale hugged him. “Crowley…” Clawed fingers dug into the demon’s back and his shoulders arched. “Crowley, I’m sorry, but it’s just so _awful_ and I can’t-”

He could hear the tears in the angel’s voice, and he knew they had spilled over by the slight damp feeling on his shoulder. For a moment, they let their souls ache. Even then, Crowley recognized that, between the legions of demons and flocks of angels, there really was just one person who would later become the only one who didn’t take any amusement in Crowley’s hatred for this fucking century.

Brilliant, then.

When they finally withdrew, it was slow, and then it crashed all at once.

“I wanted to do something to help them,” Aziraphale explained wearily, tears streaming down his face that he made no attempt to suppress. “But I’ve tried all I can; it’s like it never ends, it never stops! No matter how much I heal, or what I try, or how I beg Her to stop it all…”

Crowley’s voice was hoarse with the effort to keep his own tears at bay. “They’re humans. They’ll all die anyway. And I know that, but…”

Aziraphale shook his head. “It’s wrong. This! This isn’t how it should happen.”

“I have tried.” Crowley pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “To heal them, that is. I know there are things demons aren’t meant to do, but I’ve done some of them. And I thought I’d try to…but I can’t…”

Aziraphale made a complicated noise. “You tried to heal them?”

“Of course, I did.”

“You’re a demon. I thought…I wondered if…”

Crowley’s eyes narrowed as his blood went cold, his voice coming out sharp with unmasked irritation. “I played no part in this, Aziraphale, okay? Not even Hell did. You think I wanted this shit to happen? Because I didn’t. It just is.”

“That’s not what I meant, Crowley,” the angel corrected with urgency, but softness. “I know demons can’t heal, but I had wondered if…well, you aren’t a very good demon.”

Crowley looked to the sky, a smug shade of teal. “Fuck off.”

Aziraphale was unbothered, or perhaps simply used to him by now. “Crowley, will you help me?”

He snapped his attention back to earth. “With what?”

“Will you help me help them?” Aziraphale’s voice was pleading, but it was an invitation and not a command.

Crowley could have asked how. Could have asked something reasonable, like what crazy idea Aziraphale had in mind and what it entailed.

He didn’t.

“Of course, I will."

The angel looked at him with an almost skeptical look in his eyes, and Crowley realized he’d maybe answered a touch too fast to seem sensible. “Depending on what it is,” he added after a too-long beat.

“I had a thought. It might – I don’t know if it would work.” Aziraphale looked off, eyes unfocused as he contemplated something. “And…it might hurt? A lot.”

“I thought we were helping them!”

“No, I mean…it might hurt you.” Aziraphale looked at him, apologetic, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, I can’t ask you to do this. Forget I said anything, Crowley.”

Crowley felt a growl rumbling in his throat and held it back. “What are you trying to do, Aziraphale?”

“I-I thought maybe I could lend you some of my essence, and you could use it to heal…” Aziraphale shook his head. “No, of course not; that’s absurd. It could kill you!”

Crowley stared at him. He could still remember how it felt. An angel’s essence, like an organ, or a chip of the soul, torn from the Fallen. He felt for the hollow of where it was taken – a hollow that remained still. “Let’s do it, then.”

“Crowley!” Aziraphale said, indignant. He hesitated a moment, looking as though he was trying to figure out how to dumb down something complicated to explain to a child. “An angel’s essence is the base of their existence. It’s the stardust She made us from. But it’s also holy, too holy for you to touch without it tearing you apart.” At Crowley’s confused expression, he gave a small sigh and buried his face in his hands. “Listen, I don’t think it’s possible. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. I just…I’m out of ideas!”

“Angel, you-”

Before he could continue, the angel, suddenly aware of how they stood in the center of a street of dying humans, interrupted. “Let’s not discuss this further.”

“You’re right. We should talk somewhere private.” Crowley gestured vaguely northwest, knowing full well that wasn’t what Aziraphale meant. “Not exactly safe, nowhere is safe, but…” He faltered. “Then we can discuss our options.”

Aziraphale looked genuinely surprised. “Do you have any ideas?”

“I want to persuade you. Come, this way.” Crowley immediately stalked past the angel toward a building he knew to be vacated of anything dead or alive, hesitating long enough to hear that Aziraphale, at the very least, was following him. It really wasn’t much of a place, but nowhere in Europe was exactly faring well. Barren and dreary, and more than a little dirty, but, again, nothing dead at least. And it was hidden.

“Aziraphale.” Crowley said his name like a command, despite it having no clear indication of action.

“Crowley?”

“Share your essence with me, here, now.”

Aziraphale looked scandalized. “No, Crowley! I-I want to help the humans, and I know if you could heal, we’d save so many lives. But…what might the cost be?”

“Angel, calm down,” Crowley said, rolling his eyes as the last of his patience gave out. “I don’t see why you’re freaking out when you’ve already done this before! So, what’s the problem, exactly?”

Aziraphale’s face paled. “W…What? When?”

Crowley couldn’t believe this. How does one forget that kind of thing? Did he seriously not remember – was that why he was acting so strange about it? “Aziraphale, you shared your essence with me when we first met,” the demon said slowly, nearly offended by the fact that he actually had to explain this. “In Eden?”

The angel took a step back. “No. No, I couldn’t have. That was surely not…I didn’t…” He didn’t bother trying to cap the sentence.

Crowley felt something twist in his chest: irritation and something else. “Did you do it by accident, then?”

“You can’t share essence by accident, Crowley!” Aziraphale exclaimed. “You think I could just drop stardust and forget about it?”

“But…” Crowley couldn’t wrap his head around it. Even now, he remembered how it felt. The angel had spread his wing over the demon’s head, and Crowley had nearly choked on the sensation that flooded his veins. It was like searing with holy water that infested his blood and he thought he was dying. But when he looked to the angel, Aziraphale wasn’t even looking at the demon he’d just shared essence with, as though he trusted Crowley could handle it. The stardust settled, like a layer of grime on Crowley’s bones, and the pain stopped all in an instant.

For then.

Crowley had carried that essence inside him carefully. It was not much, hardly a drop. While angels and demons could both perform magic and miracles, an angel’s essence was different. It was a tether to Heaven that allowed the angel to accept from a higher power, to do things only an angel was meant to be tasked with.

Most “Blessings” Crowley had performed with their Arrangement did not require any Heavenly influences. A demon could just as easily move and manifest things as an angel, for these things were neutral ground, not inherently evil or good.

Healing was different.

No demon would ever need to heal another, as sympathy and camaraderie were less the thing than mindless destruction and temptation. Not a demon in Hell could conceive of a situation in which they’d want to heal even a fellow damned one. It was not something the Fallen were allowed to have or supposed to want. The connection to Heaven was cut when an angel lost their essence.

Crowley had not felt that flicker of Holy Warmth in his chest for, well, since before time was invented. There was no way to quantify it, but when he held that tiny, tiny throb of Aziraphale’s Light, it made him scorch with sorrow and regret for what was lost, yet he clung to it all the more.

He tried to hold on to it for as long as possible, but his body was not made to keep it. It started to take a toll on the health of Crowley’s corporation, and he knew he had to let it go, let it into the world so it could return to its host.

About a century into the world’s history, Crowley released it in a forest, which bloomed and flooded the floor in vines and flowers as the tiny slip of light faded away and found its way home. It felt like losing a friend, somehow, like being abandoned by someone who promised to keep you close. The next time Crowley saw Aziraphale, the angel didn’t mention it, or ask about it, so Crowley didn’t say anything. He assumed the angel felt it unsafe to mention should their bosses catch wind.

That was how Crowley understood an angel’s essence. He’d carried it in his body for 100 years, even when it burned him, simply because he didn’t know what to do with it. But he knew, now, if he had that essence, he wouldn’t keep it. He would let it heal the dying humans, as many as he could possibly reach, and let Aziraphale take it back to heal again.

And maybe it wouldn’t do much, in the end. Maybe he’d save a few hundred humans, or a few dozen, or even just one. He thought of the dying child from before and was sure that’d be enough for him, just the one.

Hardly demonic.

That thought he kept to himself, but it was in two miracled chairs, and over a long night, that Crowley told this story to Aziraphale, who listened with rapt attention but refused to interject, even when Crowley paused to let him. He stayed silent as the dead, as though there weren’t plenty of those around, and when he finished, Aziraphale still said nothing.

“I didn’t realize then, that it’d been accidental,” Crowley explained. “I thought you’d meant to give it to me. At first, I thought maybe it was a curse. But the next time I saw you, I decided it must have been…well. A gift.” He grimaced, remembering to add, “Not that I needed it.”

“I remember,” Aziraphale said finally, his first words in well over an hour. “I remember that feeling in the very early morning, and something came to me that made me feel like I was whole again. I didn’t realize it had anything to do with essence; I’d assumed the emptiness was because I had not adjusted to earth yet.” He smiled wistfully. “And in that moment, I thought I had.”

Crowley stared at his hands. “Sorry I kept it so long.”

“It’s okay. It’s almost kind that you did.”

“Demon,” Crowley pointed out, predictably. “Not kind.”

“Be that as it may…” Aziraphale shifted uncomfortably. “I suppose…if we’ve done it before, then it can’t really cause harm, can it? It really didn’t hurt you?”

Crowley shook his head. “Not for a few decades, at least. But for this…I suppose I’m only going to have to last as long as Pestilence does.”

Aziraphale made a face. “Do you know who summoned her, Pestilence? Was it your side?”

Crowley shook his head. “Hell and Heaven don’t summon Pestilence, you know that. It’s the humans who do, unless they outsource it. They always seem to beat us to it, huh.” He smiled painfully, fondly, a bit like a parent whose child has entered their rebellious stage but is rather terrible at it.

“But…I still don’t understand,” Aziraphale murmured. “How could I have done such a thing without noticing?”

Crowley shrugged. He didn’t think he was supposed to actually answer that.

Aziraphale stood suddenly. “Are you ready, then?”

Crowley rose to face the angel with a solemn nod.

“Alright, then. Well.” Aziraphale closed his eyes and his wings burst out of his back, tearing into his clothing with a satisfying rip of fibers. His feathers were a brilliant white but disorderly with lack of care – for once, Crowley couldn’t judge, for trying times had led him to neglect his own wings as well. Crowley wasn’t entirely sure how an angel gave essence when it wasn’t by accident, half expecting some murmured angelic mantra, but he didn’t have any more time to wonder before he nearly collapsed under the enormous, searing weight that suddenly choked his innards in a revolting twist that burst to destroy him.

It lasted hardly a second, perhaps a seventh of a half of a millisecond if someone was counting. Regardless, his awareness was stilled in an existence from a corporation that lay limp on the floor.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale’s wings collapsed into his back as he quickly fell to his knees beside the demon, face beset with worry. “I’m so sorry, that was so much more than I’d intended! I didn’t mean to-”

Crowley hardly heard. Inside of his chest was a light, a Light that should have charred his marrow and ligaments, should have felt like Hel – like Heaven, that is. It pulsed like a heartbeat against him, and he had the sense of an extra organ existing inside of his body, taking up an unoccupied space. But it was just Light, drifting throughout him curiously. It wanted to explore, so he let it, and for a moment, all other senses vanished as the curious Light investigated his body and his soul. He wasn’t afraid.

He had no idea how long it lasted, but when he remembered his other senses – such as sight – he realized that Aziraphale was beside him.

Crowley took a breath.

“Oh!” Aziraphale gasped as Crowley’s eyes opened, wide and dilated. “Oh, God above! I thought you’d discorporated or worse! You weren’t breathing!”

“Right, yeah,” Crowley managed as he regained the function of his vocal cords. “Just needed to let it explore.”

“You…” Aziraphale looked overwhelmed. “You what?”

Crowley shook his head, not feeling up for explaining it. “It doesn’t hurt, for now. I think I can…”

His muscles trembled as he stood up, Aziraphale keeping a hold on his arm for balance. Crowley was surprised to find that he didn’t need it and determination flared in him. “I think I can heal, Aziraphale,” he stated, eyes aflame. “Let go, and I will.”

Aziraphale let go, still looking concerned. But, rather like his Light, he mostly looked curious.

London, in the Year of Someone’s Lord 1356

There was no precise moment that it ended, if it really did. But the worst of it was over, and it was worse than anyone could have guessed but Pestilence herself. Scholars would spend centuries puzzling over the “event” – as though it was a thing and not a series of things – and trying to guess just how many died. There were a lot of statistics and a lot of claims. No one really could come to an agreement, and so the range remained wide with questions and a lack of documentation.

All that really mattered was that it was more than it should have been, but at least ten thousand less than it would have been, unbeknownst to all but She.

Crowley met Aziraphale again. They’d both traveled across Europe after their last encounter, completing the tasks given them by their respective offices. And they did much more than that. Crowley found the souls that fought and let them fight but made it easier. There were many times more that he did not save, that he could not save, and some that he didn’t try to save. There was no mistaking him for a paragon, yet he was far from the villain.

Hell was unawares; they could not trace magic done with an angel’s essence. As far as Crowley knew, Heaven didn’t know either, or else assumed that anything done with Aziraphale’s essence was probably also done by him. As logical as it was incorrect, ultimately.

Crowley was tired. He was tired of Azrael’s stench and Pestilence’s odor and the earth’s aroma, all tainted and buried into his memories until he nearly dreamed of them. The humans had been through worse, and they would probably go through worse, again and again, always getting themselves into trouble. But this was different for Crowley, intimate in a way that nothing of the humans, good or bad, had managed. These years would haunt him.

He didn’t know that yet when he saw Aziraphale in a pub with a bottle that was definitely too fine to have naturally come across and sat down across from him without a word.

Aziraphale didn’t even look surprised. A second glass appeared in his hand and for an hour, they each nursed their alcohol in sips, remarkably restrained in intake as the distraction of the now kept them sober in both regards. They both stared into the distance without seeing the grimy pub floorboards.

“I’ll give it back, now,” Crowley said, eventually. “Pestilence has gone back to, well, wherever she goes. I’m sure you angels can handle the rest.”

Aziraphale didn’t answer for a time, taking a long, slow sip of wine. Crowley had started to wonder if he even heard him at all when Aziraphale muttered, “Keep it.”

Crowley took a beat to process this and still didn’t quite manage it. “Come again?”

Aziraphale finally faced him. Every angle of his face looked deeply etched with sorrow and exhaustion, but a twinge of a demonic smirk twitched into his expression. “I think you should keep it. The essence.”

“Bu…Angel, no. You can’t just give me your essence again!” Crowley exclaimed. “I won’t be able to hold it, you know that. And you said it left you feeling…what was it you said? Incomplete? Take it back.”

But Aziraphale was shaking his head. “Crowley, I want you to keep it. I want you to carry it with you, take care of it and shield it and use it how you wish. And when you can’t stand it anymore, send it back.” His eyes, long dead, glimmered with what may have been mischief. Crowley got the sense it was the closest the angel had come to smiling in years – and he was right.

There wasn’t anything to say to that.

They parted on somewhat awkward terms, as though there weren’t words enough to express what this, all of this, had been. The death, the sorrow, and the life, the joy. And there weren’t – words, that is. Scholars would try, and teachers would try, and writers would try, but there weren’t enough words.

London, in the Year of Someone’s Lord 2019

He’d forgotten at some point.

Years went by, first, followed by decades. Eventually, it turned to centuries, and that little pulse of light – of Aziraphale’s Light – remained dormant in Crowley’s chest, a tiny burning secret. It felt unnatural at first, but time gave way to more time and he really, genuinely forgot about it. He forgot, too, that demons weren’t supposed to be able to heal, weren’t supposed to be able to save a life rather than eradicate it, and it came to him as though he’d done so since the Beginning. He didn’t even think of it once until the night after he and Aziraphale had fooled their respective offices with the body swap, and he was in his flat alone wishing he wasn’t.

And he felt it…stirring.

“What the Heaven?” he muttered, sitting up. He gingerly put his hands on his chest, as though he might feel it there, against his fingertips. But it was in deep, like trying to touch his own soul, and just like that, it settled.

Crowley’s mind flooded with memories. He tried not to think about The Black Death too much, which may have helped to repress his memory of the essence he carried in him. But that shouldn’t have changed the fact that he had a fucking angel’s essence inside his damn chest for centuries and had _forgotten._

He could recall the sear of it before, that first time. How it became unbearable, like fire in his blood. Gently, he reached out to it, to make sure it was still there. And it was, in a way, but, with a start, he realized he couldn’t really discern it from anything else – like trying to separate personality traits even though they all bled into each other.

It had melded.

His phone was ringing, and he answered immediately, already having an idea of who it was.

“Crowley, dear?”

“Angel? What is it?"

“Did you…do you remember…?” Aziraphale seemed unsure of how to put it.

“Did you feel it, then?” Crowley offered, a question and an answer.

Aziraphale paused. “It…it’s like it came back, but not quite.”

Crowley shook his head. “I still have it, angel. It’s still here. But it’s different than it was before.”

“Has it been hurting you?”

“Not at all,” Crowley responded truthfully. “I’d forgotten until it, I dunno, shook.”

Aziraphale let out a soft breath. “It’s the strangest sensation. As though that piece of my essence is at home, even though it’s not with me.”

Crowley was grateful he was on the phone, so the angel didn’t bear witness to the absolutely ridiculous expression he made, then.

Crowley hated the fourteen century, and he always would. There was no denying that it was among the worst experiences of Crowley’s life and little made him tremble with anger and grief in that way – only one, more private moment, involving flames and books, could rival it. And time had done its damnedest to heal that wound, to scab it over. To help Crowley’s memories drown out the muffled cries, cotton in his ears and shades over his eyes, but nothing could keep at bay the frigid fear carved in blood into his hands by the touch of the dead.

It was not something anyone should’ve had to carry in their head for so long.

But he had, and it had been almost 700 years and it still lingered. Maybe he’d never really get past it. Maybe Pestilence would always be his least favorite of Anything that Existed Ever and he’d still wake up remembering how it tasted for Death to roam without rest.

These were his scars.

But still, despite it all, despite every reason he had not to, he let himself smile then, because it turned out that there may have been at least one half-decent thing to come from the fourteenth century. And he would take what he could get.

**Author's Note:**

> I’ll be honest, this quickly came to feel disrespectful to write. I’ve studied this particular plague in great detail and there’s really no overestimating or overstating just how awful it was. I wanted to emphasize that in this fic, but I also knew this was a story about Crowley and this idea I had about essence.  
> So, I leaned into it, but I also had some give.  
> I hope I acquired a balance that made sense and that, whatever this was, you enjoyed it for the mess it is.  
> (10.30.20: Made a few edits to this today, including to the tags and summary. Nothing major.)


End file.
